I don’t know where to begin. I guess that’s the reason why I want to write right now. I am having a REAL tough week. In an effort to share the good/the bad/the ugly cries, let me fill you in a bit.

I don’t know about you but since I have left high school, my social life has been on a rollercoaster of ups and downs, chucking some poor souls right off my ride. I have jumped from group to group trying to find a “squad”, walking away with a few gems but quite a few more duds. It’s not that I think people suck and I am great, I just haven’t been able to find my people. The people who want to slackline, people who want to do yoga on the stage at Canatara, people who don’t mind me trying reiki or acro or anything else with them.

I have been feeling lost because friendships are really hecking hard to navigate. There are great days and awful days and when they bleed together, it’s just so BLAH. Am I making any sense? Probably not but I hope you feel what I’m trying to get at. It feels like I am swimming in a dark ocean and I just want some pals to help me survive the ride. It’s lonely out here!!

This morning was awful. I have really intense anxiety about going to work. It makes no sense. I love what I do, where I work and the people I work with are amazing. (Shoutout to any folks from the TV reading this, you are AWESOME) Anyways, this morning my anxiety came on so hard and fast all I could do was cry and cry and cry. I felt like I was walking thru a daze and it SUCKED. If you have pre-work anxiety, please know you aren’t alone. Catch me in my car every day at 2:45 having a meltdown over nothing. Luckily, I had a very handsome manbear to hold me and remind me everything would be okay.

Blah. Does any of this make sense? Am I a loser to post this? Meh, who carezzzzz. Hope you catch my drift. It’s okay to be lost and lonely and scared, just keep showing up and pushing forward anyways…whatever that looks like to you.

It is finally warming up around here. I don’t see any snow and I feel very #blessed about that. I have been hanging out in my room going through clothes and purging. It feels amazing!! My closet was a disgusting black hole where sweaters went to die so I fixed that all up and I am feeling great.

Today, I am taking a road trip. Maybe you know or maybe you don’t, but I suffer with intense driving anxiety. It will show up out of nowhere and freaks me TF out. Luckily, I have beautiful Fancy Nan to drive me safely to visit our H. I have a book full of mindfulness practices (thank you Gramma!) packed with me so I am ready for anything. I am feeling okay and I laid off the coffee this morning so it should be smooth sailing.

I am sharing this with you because I think it is important to face your fears in the ways you feel comfortable. There are many things we can’t control but we can control how we respond to situations. My sweet darling friend Heather wanted me to visit her. I felt intense anxiety about getting there. Instead of “trucking it out” and nail-biting my way thru that drive, I decided to ask Nan if I could join her. I get to have my cake and eat it too, people! You can decide how you respond to the invitation. You have so much power!

I must go and make a tea for the drive. Keep it real my friends, don’t forget to be bold and brave and quiet and meek and know that it is all working together. Love you!

I have “had it all figured out” more times than I can count. I try to take it easy on myself because I am only 22 hecking years old and I am just out to have a lot of fun. I get reaaaaallly easily bored with jobs/school/hobbies and move onto the next bright idea I have. LOL.

I am currently going thru a weird period. I am working a job I love, doing awesome work that really helps people directly, but I feel uninspired. I show up and give my all to make sure my people have an awesome day. I go home, read books, eat up podcasts & try to do the whole self-improvement thing. Most of the time, I feel in the zone and on my game. January always fucks that all up. The snow and cold absolutely put me into a weird space.

BUUUUUUUUT.

I have been here before & I will be here again. Life is so crazy. When I was in high school, I was a tough little beyotch (or so I thought teehee). No adults knew what they were talking about because how could they have possibly ever felt what I was feeling?! Hehehhahahahhohooho. Listen to your mom, she always will know more than you do. Anyways, I would roll my eyes whenever someone sat me down and told me that the world wasn’t ending. (UM, yes it was, I puked in the hall at the high school dance! LIfE wAs OvErRrRRRrRRRR) I have always had a dramatic flair to my feelings but lately I have been learning how to see them, feel them, and then let them go & move on with my day.

I am really bad with piecing things together lately. Hopefully you are picking up what I’m putting down here. January sucks, you will get through this, I am here for you! As the great Oprah Winfrey once said, “Passion is energy. Feel the power that comes from focusing on what excites you.”

Until next time,
Alexis

PS. If I have been ignoring you or being a real asshat with plan-making, consider this my apology. I love you! I am going thru LIFE, thanks for being my friend.

I am back! I just got home late last night from my 10-hour drive straight from Nashville. My mama, sisters and I went. Suuuuuuch a victory. It is the most amazing place!

Our first day we went down Broadway & visited a few bars, shopped way too much and ate sooooo much pork I think I gained 25 (delicious) pounds. The absolute best pulled sammy was at Martin’s. I wish I could inject their sauce into my VEINS. 😍 We spent a night at the Opry which was magical to be a part of. There were so many cool acts, all unique but somehow went together perfectly. The stage is huge. It felt so neat to be sitting in the same seats soooo many others had sat in before, enjoying the same experience. Our last supper was by far the best thing that happened FO SHO. My sweet, sweet, sweet mother treated us to The Melting Pot. Which for you peasants out there, is a FONDUE restaurant!! I will never forget that cheese fondue. I wanted to take the hot bowl and stuff the entire thing down my gullet. I resisted that but hot dang, the apple/melty cheese bites were sooooo heavenly. I had such a fun time with my framjam & I can’t wait to see where we go next.

But with as always, when you are having a great time, life hands you a slap of reality ✊🙀 I finally paid off my car after 2 hellish years of jacked up interest payments YEHAW. I have been driving around for awhile, blissfully ignoring the rattling of my car and the bright ABS light everytime I turned the beauty on. Today I decided to swallow my pride and get it checked.

F*ck.

Two bald tires, one almost snapped bearing and a mental breakdown later, I left my sweetie behind in the shop and went home with my mom (oh ya, the stress of dealing with any car issues sends me off the deep end so I ran from the guy, bawling like a baby and called my mommy to rescue me). Suuuuuuch a defeat.

Life has been throwing me a few wacky curveballs all at once but I know I can handle it. I can’t help but look back in these moments and be thankful for my coping skills I developed over the years. Back in highschool, if this happened to my car, I would have not been able to gain perspective of the situation so quickly. Although I had a huge cry, so what? Tomorrow I will begrudingly pay the kind mechanic what he wants and be back on the road. I am not quite sure what I am trying to say here, but just know that you are doing better than you think you are.

Did you hear? It’s almost 2018! I am feel gratified in what I accomplished this year but also definitely ready for a breath of new air. The change of the calendar year always sparks some big internal movements for me so I figured I could do some summarizing here 🙂 Before I get into all those juicy future projects & tingz, let me have a moment of reflection.

I rang in 2017 with a tight group of people & an insane amount of food. Justin’s pulled pork is LEGIT. The Packer’s won the NFC North title & all was well in the world. I was working casually at a nursing home where I live, applying to programs I thought were totally right for me (spoiler: nope). This summer, I was lucky enough to become employed with a wonderful social service organization as a job coach. I worked 1 on 1 with 3 students in the community and reconnected with my desire to demand more from my work. I didn’t just want to work for a paycheque but I desired to feel dang fulfilled at the end of the day. Working as a PSW was an amazing experience but personal care doesn’t leave much time for social connection. My new job is totally awesome & I get to spend 1 on 1 time working with clients who fill me with joy each hour.

The last few months have been a total whirlwind but I am so happy to be here. This year I have dove deep into my passion for yoga, cooking and personal development. I have gained invaluable skills from how to properly store food for freezing, to figuring out which breathing techniques can calm me down quickest.

I won some, I lost some, I made it.

Now, ONTO THE JUICY STUFF. I am super excited for the new year. Over the holidays, my friend gifted me the most amazing personalized journal. My mom gave me a yoga sequencing deck and I have been trying to more actively incorporate structure into my mat time. I am preparing some posts for a reveal in the next few months with some instructional yoga! Woo0o0o0o0o0t. I’m not yet certified but I’d love to show you how I do my thing and see if that helps you 🙂

I also have been diving back into my love of reading lately. I want to share more on that too 🙂 I have a whack load of books about a whack load of different things. Let me know if either of these two things sound coolio to you!

Thanks for reading. I hope however you choose to ring in the new year, you have a great time. Be kind, do good things for others, never forget to blow out the candles.

I have been thinking a lot about timelines. Engrained in us since our first day of school is something like graduate, go to college, graduate, get job, get married, get house. Wowie. Heck that!

I have been thinking a lot about how there is no right or wrong way to this. Thinking about how when I gave myself space to tweak my path here & there, it opened up a whole can of courage inside of me.

I have been thinking a lot about how there is space for everything. Why can’t there be room for yoga lovers and shrimp lovers (ew) to co-exist? Teehee. A little bit woo-woo but I am so dang serious in my sentiment.

Don’t let people scare you or spook you or talk you out of following whatever you feel is right for you. Keeping it short and sweet because I am cuddling with a dog infront of a fire right now.

Today I checked my Linkedin page. What would seem like a boring & mundane task to some, was the exact same action that sent me off the emotional deep end. I consider myself an extremely outgoing & positive person but the cold, overcast weather always hits me fiercely. Throw in the fact that I dropped out of my golden ticket program and you have a pretty good mix for a meltdown.

When I logged onto my page, I was immediately hit with all the current updates in the nuclear sector & power engineering world. How thrilling! I had 2 invites from prior classmates who are still continuing in the course. I felt a sting of disappointment in myself. It hurts to pay the piper and be honest about what you want to do with the rest of forever. I thought that I was going to run the plants and show the boys who the real boss was, but instead I am just another CPET dropout.

Of course I know I am not failing. The program was not for me and I won’t let the fact that I let it go become a heavy rock I carry forever. But right now, it fecking sucks. I poured my heart into getting in and cried actual tears of joy when I got my acceptance. I felt like I had the world in front of me and now I don’t.

But the thing is, I do. I have all the same opportunities accessible to me just maybe not the proper qualifications for some. That’s fine! I can’t do it all, yo! Neither can you. Take a breather. We are in this together. It feels so dang good to have moments of acceptance where I know I made the right choice. I am working with clients and am able to bring more fun & recreation to their life. I am so lucky! Bumps in the road happen to everyone, I just am finding the space to let myself be disappointed but then get over it. Things are looking up, always.